Students who want to enrol on courses for English for Speakers of Other Languages (Esol) are being put off by costs and complicated paperwork to access financial support, it emerged this week.

As the new college term begins, a survey of some members of the National Association for Teaching English and Community Languages to Adults (Natecla) found that enrolment numbers had fallen compared with the same time last year, as government funding changes began to bite.

Members blamed the decline in enrolments on the price of courses, the complicated process of applying for help to meet costs through learner support funds - beefed up to specifically help the spouses of refugees or migrants on low pay to access lessons - and cuts in the number of courses on offer this autumn. Some colleges, anticipating less demand for courses because more people would have to pay fees, have cut provision, or shifted focus away from basic skills to level 2 programmes.

The co-chairs of the association, Irene Austin and Anne McKeown, said: "We accept that enrolment is still continuing and there are always problems during any transition, but the general picture is that numbers are down. Potential learners are not completing their enrolment when they discover how much they have to pay and others are put off by the additional amount of paperwork they need to provide."

From last month, only asylum seekers under the age of 19 or those still waiting for a decision on their asylum claim after six months are entitled to free Esol lessons. The government said demand for English courses had become a drain on education budgets.

The Natecla survey, which provides anecdotal evidence of how the changes are affecting course providers, found that colleges were also experiencing problems allocating money through the discretionary learners support fund.

Some have described the fund, implemented locally, as "woefully inadequate", while others admitted they are unclear about what would serve as evidence of hardship.

"This is surely not what the government intended when they assured the sector that they would find accessible ways of learners proving that they were on low incomes and that the learner support funds would protect vulnerable adults such as spouses who might not be able to produce the documentation," said Natecla.

Bill Rammell, the minister for lifelong learning, told EducationGuardian.co.uk today that demand for English had become "unsustainable" and tough decisions had needed to be made.

"This government has tripled funding for Esol and has invested over £1bn, but the demand has become unsustainable and there is no blank cheque - we cannot continue to provide free English classes for every single person who wants them.

"There's been speculation that we are cutting the funding to Esol - this isn't true - but to help those who need it the most we've had to make some tough decisions, we owe it to taxpayers and we owe it to the people who need Esol support the most to ensure we use the money in the best way."

He maintained that the most vulnerable learners were protected. Those who were in receipt of benefits would continue to get free classes and those asked for a contribution, would only pay around a third of the fees this year.

Mr Rammell added: "We will, however, continue to monitor the impact and take-up of Esol to consider the effect of the changes that have been put into place."

Yesterday, members of the Universities and Colleges Union, which has spearheaded the Save Esol campaign, held a day of protest over the funding changes.